My conduct was not heroic on that occasion I am afraid. With one bound I sprang behind a big elm, and, from that position of safety, hurled vituperation at my unintentional assailants, ordering them to desist. It took me some moments to convince myself I had not been hit, but the shock to my system was, I confess, considerable. From the theatre we strolled through the big doors into the Salles de jeux. I tossed a hundred-franc note on the rouge and left it there. Red came up six times, and I gathered up my winnings. The ball clicked again the seventh time, and black came up! An old man with fingers like claws, and horribly long and dirty nails, introduced himself, engaged me in conversation, and ended by trying to induce me to partake in his infallible system for winning at roulette! What a lot of rubbish has been written about the Rooms at Monte! The first time I went there--when I was quite a youth--I expected to find a sort of Aladdin's palace, myriad glittering lights everywhere, gorgeously-dressed women sparkling with diadems and precious stones. Instead, I sauntered into a series of large, lofty, heavily-gilded rooms with an atmosphere one could cut with a knife, in which were several long tables with people sitting round them, quite common-looking people, and anything but smart; the majority of the women were bloused and skirted tourists. One might have mistaken the scene for a number of board-meetings in progress simultaneously, but for the fact that in the centre of each table sat men in funereal black who, at intervals, droned monotonously through their noses-- "_Messieurs, faites vos jeux_." And then a little later-- "_Rien n'va plus_!" Then the click of the ball, and the jingle of money lost and won. It was one of the greatest disillusionments I have ever experienced. There was nothing in the least exciting, nothing sensational. There was a rustle of notes, and the whole scene was sordid, debasing. I can remember only one other disillusionment that has given me so great a shock. I experienced that the first time I visited Niagara Falls. I had seen pictures in plenty of the Falls, and had based thereon my idea of what the Falls would look like when I got there. I arrived at noon, eager to gaze upon "Nature's Marvellous Phenomenon," as the booklet of the Railway Company described it. The first thing I saw was a truly gigantic hoarding-board advertising somebody's lung-tonic, alongside it one recommending some one else's Blood Capsules, and then, whichever way I looked, the landscape, which should have been gorgeous, was disfigured by similar announcements. Even the water was spoilt, for some of the falls being harnessed to dye-works, ran in shades of dirty greens and reds and yellows, and when I wanted to go under the main Falls I found I must buy a ticket at a box-office and go down in a lift. Never, I remember thinking, have the words, "Where only man is vile," been more applicable than at Niagara.